With Justin Trudeau looking on, Conservative Senator Patrick Brazeau shows off a Liberal hockey sweater in Ottawa on April 2, 2012. Mr. Brazeau wore the sweater as part of a bet after losing a charity boxing match to the Montreal MP. (Adrian Wyld/THE CANADIAN PRESS)

With Justin Trudeau looking on, Conservative Senator Patrick Brazeau shows off a Liberal hockey sweater in Ottawa on April 2, 2012. Mr. Brazeau wore the sweater as part of a bet after losing a charity boxing match to the Montreal MP.(Adrian Wyld/THE CANADIAN PRESS)

The youngest senator in the upper chamber also has the poorest attendance record for this session of Parliament.

Conservative Senator Patrick Brazeau, 37, was absent for 25 per cent of the 72 sittings between June 2011 and April 2012, the Senate attendance register shows.

By the end of that period, the Quebecker was four days away from being fined. Senators are allowed to miss up to 21 days in each parliamentary session for religious holidays, family illness or obligations, and funerals and grief.

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They can also be away on public business, such as travel or a parliamentary delegation, as long it was unavoidable.

After that, they can be fined $250 for each day missed.

The records for May and June have not been submitted yet.

Between June 2011 and April 2012, Mr. Brazeau also missed 65 per cent of meetings at the aboriginal peoples committee on which he sits.

And he was away for 31 per cent of the meetings of the human rights committee, where he is deputy chair.

The senator, appointed in 2008 by Prime Minister Stephen Harper, sent an e-mail response to a request for comment.

“The very simple answer to your question with respect to my attendance or lack thereof is for personal matters,” said Mr. Brazeau, former national chief of the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples.

He did not elaborate, but later posted a message on Twitter directed to this reporter: “while u smile Jen, others suffer. Change the D to a B in your last name and we’re even! Don’t mean it but needs saying.”

The comment provoked a Twitter firestorm, and Mr. Brazeau later tweeted an apology:

“I’m a hardworker and take my position seriously but personal issues always comes 1st. Ppl are sometimes in need. Sorry!”

Mr. Brazeau was highly visible in the media in late March, as he faced Liberal MP Justin Trudeau in a televised charity boxing match. He was favoured to win, but lost the fight in a technical knockout.

New Democrat MP Charlie Angus said Mr. Brazeau is the “latest poster boy” for a democratically challenged institution.

“It’s surprising that he shows up at all,” said Mr. Angus. “He’s got a gig for life. There’s no accountability, there’s no censure, he’s going to sit there until he’s 75.”

The NDP supports abolishing the Senate.

Other senators who top the absentee list are Liberal Romeo Dallaire and Conservative Janis Johnson. Both senators say they have good reasons for their absences.

Mr. Dallaire’s records show he is six absentee days away from being fined, having missed 22 per cent of the Senate sittings.

The author and retired army lieutenant-general said he has a lot of public engagements, and spent three-and-a-half weeks in the Democratic Republic of Congo, South Sudan and the Central African Republic continuing his research on child soldiers.

“I took that time, as much as I could over Easter, but it ran over into Senate days,” Mr. Dallaire said in an interview.

Mr. Dallaire missed 17 per cent of meetings on both the national security and defence committee and the subcommittee on veterans affairs. Minutes show Mr. Dallaire also wasn’t present for two of the five meetings of the special anti-terrorism committee.

Ms. Johnson was missing from the Senate floor 19 per cent of the time. She is eight days away from being penalized financially.

Ms. Johnson emphasizes that she has had a good attendance record during her 22 years in the Senate. The Winnipeg resident says she is the sole caregiver for a terminally ill aunt. She added that she was ill during the winter and her office failed to note that in the register.

Ms. Johnson also notes she is co-chair of the Canada-United States Inter-parliamentary Group.

“I pride myself in doing my job and I work really hard in the province as well. ... I take it very seriously.”

Ms. Johnson missed two-thirds of the meetings of the energy, environment and natural resources committee. She says was directed to sit on the committee against her wishes, by Sen. Marjory LeBreton, the government leader in the Senate.

“What happened is they were in the middle of a report or coming to the end of a report that I had nothing to do with,” Ms. Johnson said of her appointment to the committee last June.